Inland organic farms harvest is flavored by sun, soil

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Tony Mueller, director of the university's office of community
service learning, says the Harneds are an invaluable resource.

"We basically do what Jason says," he said with a laugh.

If all goes well, in a few months the campus cafeteria will
serve both Three Sisters produce and vegetables from SURF, the
Sustainable University of Redlands Farm.

Roberto Argentina, chef and owner of the Farm Artisan Foods in
downtown Redlands, focuses his menu on locally grown edibles,
preferably organic. He buys from Three Sisters on Thursdays,
tailoring his menu to the food that's in season. He takes pleasure
in cooking with such fresh produce.

"We're actually cleaning the dirt off the onions," he said,
sitting at the bar in his State Street establishment.

Last June, the Harneds' farm was one of two in San Timoteo
Canyon to host a fundraising party for the Redlands Conservancy, a
nonprofit group that works to preserve the town's culture, heritage
and open space, including agricultural land. The event, called
Feasting on the Farm, sold out quickly and may be repeated next
year.

Organic challenges

Three Sisters is a certified organic farm, which means the
Harneds use no chemical pesticides or fertilizers and grow from
organic seeds. Spent plants go into a compost heap with horse
manure and ground-up rocks and eventually are recycled into the
soil.

The Harneds further enrich the soil with a cover crop of
buckwheat that grows for a month, then is turned under to add
nutrients. Every 100-foot-long row gets that treatment once a
year.

"It makes beautiful soil," Abby Harned says.

When the Harneds bought the property nine years ago, there was
not a plant on it, she said.

"Everything you see growing here, we've planted," she said.

They have added native plants around the outskirts -- oaks,
sycamore, spruce and cottonwood trees -- and grapevines and fruit
trees closer to the house.

In their first year, they had little or no trouble with
bugs.

"We fool the bugs. We have a lot of kinds of crops and we move
them around a lot," Abby Harned said.

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